My two biggest are having a solid career, and having gotten a lot of traveling and fun out of my system.

My husband & I have not wanted a child until about 28 since we got together, but now that I am considering going to law school, we keep inching the time back further and further, until possibly around 30yrs old, if ever.

no kids yet, but having a stable career, at a minimum a year’s worth of savings in the bank (in case of any unknown emergencies) and ideally we would like to own a home just because I don’t want to rush the process of kids and want to enjoy the process of decorating the babies room and knowing it could be a room he/she grows into.

ETA: I am sure we would be fine “making it work” without all the above things, but I don’t want to make it work, babies are only babies for so long and I want to have the luxury of enjoying every minute of it without having to worry about money and all the “other things” I wouldn’t have to worry about had I waited a bit longer.

As my very “wise” fortune cookie once said, “over prepare and then go with the flow”

We want to have his student loan paid off, so that will free up an additional $400 per month, and have a nest egg going. It seems as though finances are going to be great thanks to his new job… so fingers crossed!

Our home is small, but I’m okay with the idea of just having a cradle in our room for the first little while, and we’ll buy something bigger down the line and create a nursery then. It’ll be really hard to give up our low mortgage…

Probably having money saved and not living paycheck to paycheck IMO. Also being 30 for me, I wanted to enjoy my 20s before having such a responsibility. Home would be good but not a necessity depending on your area/situation.

I want to be married first. Other than that, fiances change, careers can go down the tubes, there isn’t really ever a “perfect time” to have kids.

Plus, my fiance already has a daughter so we are already in “parenting mode” so why the heck not just have more of them now? We aren’t traveling and having crazy “fun” anyway and won’t be for another 12 years any way.

Sure, our fiances are not ideal and we do not own a home, but we are successfully moving in that direction and that is the thing that matters most to me. We have a solid plan for those things.

The big thing for FI and I is that we both really want to go to Europe, and we want to make sure that we do that just the two of us before we have kids, so I put travel lots. We already own a home, and even if we didn’t, to me that and everything else on the list could still be figured out with kids in tow!

Hm. First wanting to have a child. And being married. And living together (right now my husband is living in another city during the week). I would definitely want to be able to afford a child which is a combination of building career, paying down debt and investing in savings. I don’t think a home is necessary. You can have a child as well in a rental as you can in a owned home. And while I’m glad that we’ve been able to get in a lot of traveling, I don’t plan on stopping once we have a child, so I don’t think that’s a biggie either.